I have bound two systems.

…………

Chapter 74 It Seems Unnecessary

The next day, after finishing the graduation training trip, Kasumigaoka Utaha made an appointment with Sawamura Eriri to meet on the rooftop during the school lunch break.

The temperature outside is very low at this time of year and the sky is overcast. It is not a good place to have a conversation no matter how you think about it.

But apart from this place, there was no better place for the two of them to go in school.

After all, the classrooms of the clubs they joined later were occupied by other students. The student cafeteria was too crowded and noisy. The library was quiet, but considering other people, they couldn't communicate freely.

After Eriri Sawamura arrived at the meeting place, Utaha Kasumigaoka, who had been waiting there and was standing by the iron fence on the rooftop, staring at the sky in a daze, heard the footsteps and turned back.

"You've been here much longer than I expected."

"I had no choice. The teacher asked me to go to the staff office to copy the textbooks."

Ying Lili spread her hands helplessly.

"That's it..."

Kasumigaoka Utaha nodded slightly and said nothing more. She took the lead and walked to a bench on the side and sat down.

Eriri followed her and sat down beside her.

But unlike Kasumigaoka Utaha who acted as if nothing had happened and had no reaction, after sitting down, Eriri immediately let out a breath of cold air, covered her butt and jumped up.

The bench on the rooftop was extremely cold outside. The moment I sat down, the chill penetrated directly through the skin of my thighs at the edge of my skirt. That feeling was extremely comfortable.

Seeing this, Kasumigaoka Utaha laughed out loud.

Although the blonde lady next to him has changed frequently during this period of time, and has made great progress in her thinking consciousness and interpersonal relationships compared to before, she still seems a little silly in some minor details.

Eriri looked dissatisfied with Kasumigaoka Utaha's reaction, but she just curled her lips and didn't say much.

Unlike her who was wearing over-the-knee socks with part of her thigh skin exposed, this guy was wearing pantyhose that completely covered her thigh skin. No wonder she could sit so calmly on the cold bench outside and remain indifferent.

Ying Lili sat down again, and this time she learned her lesson and pulled her skirt down a little to block out the coldness on the bench.

"So, what did you call me out for?"

Eriri hopes that Kasumigaoka will make a long story short. She is the kind of person who is afraid of cold, especially the cold, and must turn on the air conditioner and heater when she stays at home in winter.

"What could it be? What happened during the time I was away? Did anything unexpected happen?"

Kasumigaoka placed her hands on both sides of her body and looked up at the sky.

"No."

Eriri gave this answer at first, but when Kasumigaoka Utaha looked over, she changed her words.

"At least from my perspective, nothing happened."

"Really? Then, the girl named Yi-something-Yu, who has the same hair color as you, is fine too?"

"They call it the One Color Feather."

Ying Lili said unhappily,

"You obviously can't have forgotten her name, and her hair is flaxen, and mine is blond, so they're totally different."

"It doesn't matter what the details are. Answer my question first."

"I've already answered you. In my opinion, there's nothing wrong with it. At least from what I feel, Qianli doesn't have any special feelings for her."

"And what about her towards Chisato?"

Kasumigaoka continued to ask deeply.

"On the surface, there doesn't seem to be anything wrong, but..."

Eriri thought for a moment and answered.

"My female sixth sense tells me... that girl is probably not as weak as she appears to be. She won't give up so easily."

"..."

After hearing Eriri's answer, Kasumigaoka sighed lightly and an unhappy expression appeared on her face.

The current Eriri is different from before. She completely accepts and agrees with everything, so she doesn't think that anything the other person says or speculates about is groundless.

Although she used her sixth sense as an excuse to give an uncertain statement, Kasumigaoka Utaha still believed that her intuition would not be wrong.

But fortunately, it's not all bad news. At least Eriri also said clearly that she didn't feel that Chisato had any thoughts about Isshiki.

"Yesterday afternoon, after I came back, I went straight to Qianli's place. He didn't come back until almost eight o'clock."

"Yeah, I know, you called after that."

The expression on Eriri's face turned into disgust, and her fair face turned slightly red.

"Can you please not call me and talk to me seriously about work when you are doing something like that in the future, talking about the progress of the original painting and giving me suggestions? You can't even cover up your panting. Do you think I'm a fool?"

Kasumigaoka Utaha was not embarrassed at all by her shameful behavior being exposed. Instead, she calmly raised her chest and responded,

"Isn't that what good sisters should do to share with each other? Is it wrong to want you, who is not there, to feel involved?"

"...I'm serious, you're such a terrible woman, there's no hope for you."

"Don't say such useless words. You've interrupted my initial thinking."

"If you want to say something, just say it now. I don't have as much fat stored in my body as you do, so I'm not afraid of the cold."

Kasumigaoka looked at Eriri rubbing her arms with her hands, smiled disdainfully, and straightened her back even more.

"It's about the neighbor thousands of miles away. Do you remember?"

"If I remember correctly, her last name is Yukinoshita, and her name is Yukinoshita Yukino."

Kasumigaoka nodded.

"It's her. Qianli seemed to have gone home with her yesterday. The two of them even stopped at the door and talked for a long time."

"I know this because Chisato's school and Yukinoshita's school jointly organized a sports meet. Chisato was dragged into the committee by a friend, and Yukinoshita happened to be on the committee as well. Since they were on the same route during this period, the two of them came back together. Chisato briefly mentioned this to me over the phone."

Eriri stopped rubbing her arms.

"What was the content of the conversation?"

"There's nothing special worth mentioning. Just like what you just said, it's all about some joint activities between the two schools, but that's not the point. The point is the way Yukinoshita looks at Chisato."

"Eyes? What do you want to say?"

"Remember that a long time ago, we went shopping at a supermarket near the apartment building with Chisato and ran into Yukinoshita by chance?"

Following Kasumigaoka's words, Eriri began to recall.

"You mean... the time when Yukinoshita, Isshiki, and another good friend teamed up?"

"kindness."

Kasumigaoka Utaha nodded.

"Do you remember when Isshiki suddenly rushed towards Chisato, besides surprise, there were other emotions in Yukinoshita's eyes?"

"..."

Ying Lili frowned and thought for a long time.

Seeing that she remained silent for a long time, Kasumigaoka gave a direct answer.

"It's disgust, the kind of disgust that's mixed with contempt and disdain, and that makes me not want to have anything to do with it."

Combining what she said with the memory picture that she had finally retrieved, after comparing them, Eriri found that it was indeed the case.

"It's been several months, and you can still remember it so clearly."

"It's an instinctive habit. When writing novels, I often encounter situations where I need to describe people's expressions and demeanor, so in my daily life I will subconsciously pay attention to this aspect. It's not like you draw those climax faces, where imagination alone is enough."

"...Just keep talking about the matter. Can you please stop always putting me down in passing?"

"Sorry, I'm used to it."

Kasumigaoka's apology was insincere at all, and Eriri was too lazy to argue with her.

However, since Kasumigaoka specifically called her over and said so much, she roughly understood what the other party meant.

"Are you worried about something going on between Chisato and Yukinoshita?"

"I'm not worried. I just feel like something has happened between them. Otherwise, there's no way to explain the change in the neighbor's attitude towards Qianli."

Kasumigaoka sighed again and said,

"After all this, the thing I regret most now is that I chose the current location for Qianli's apartment."

Indeed, if the apartment she had decided on with the real estate agency was located somewhere else, in a sense, Suzumiya Chisato would not have had any connection with Yukinoshita Yukino, and by the way, Isshi Iroha would not have met him.

"Secondly, I probably shouldn't have participated in this graduation camp trip. Although this is an event that only happens once in a lifetime, now that I think about it, I realize that it's not as important as I thought at the beginning. Most of the time, I just followed the atmosphere of the camp and went out with a few friends. It felt no different from my usual shopping trip, except that I went to a farther place. I'll have plenty of opportunities to do this kind of thing in the future.

Last week, if I had chosen to turn down this training trip and stayed with him, maybe the situation would have been much better. Now, although nothing has happened yet, I always have a bad feeling. "

Kasumigaoka was clearly blaming herself, and her statement was like she had done something wrong and was reflecting on herself afterwards.

Ying Lili looked at her like this, blinked her eyes, then smiled easily, rubbed her palms together and exhaled,

"If you say so, then I, who can't be with Qianli all the time, also need to reflect on myself and stop thinking about the past. Some things can't be avoided by your deliberate obstruction. All we can do is to do our own thing well, and the rest can only be left to nature."

"Just let it be..."

Following Kasumigaoka's whisper, Eriri nodded slowly.

"Yeah, let it be. Even though it's a bit presumptuous, I still want to trust Qianli. After all, he made that promise to me."

"What an enviable guy. It's good to be an optimist."

"You are too gloomy..."

The worrying current situation has not been effectively resolved, but thanks to Eriri, Kasumigaoka has indeed felt a little more relaxed.

Thinking about it carefully, no matter how bad the situation is, there is always the blonde idiot in the same camp to support her, so there seems to be no need for her to be so anxious.

Although she didn't express her sincere thanks, as a reward for calming her down, Kasumigaoka Utaha still took out a disposable hot pack from her skirt pocket and handed it over.

"Really? If you have this, you should have taken it out earlier."

Ying Lili took it without hesitation.

"Qianli just sent a message saying that he seems to be attending a celebration party at school tonight and will be back late. What do you think?"

"What can I say? Just follow the original plan. I've already told my mom that I'll be staying over at your place tonight. Don't let me know if she calls you later."

"It's really troublesome. How long will this continue..."

The two chatted casually in low voices and left the rooftop side by side.

----

School ends at around four in the afternoon, and the celebration party starts at seven.

Originally, the organizers of the celebration party had expected it to be as early as possible after school, but considering that most of the participants were involved in club activities, the time was moved back a few hours.

Fukube Rishi persuaded Chisato Suzumiya to go with him to the student union to kill time, but was rejected.

Chisato Suzumiya didn't think it was interesting to watch the student council handling various school affairs.

Therefore, during this waiting period, Suzumiya Chisato chose to follow Goto Ichisato Jun to their own company to visit everyone who had ended the band.

On the way to the company, Suzumiya Chisato also roughly understood that in recent days, Ijichi Hoshige had relaxed his discipline on them and was no longer as strict as before, which gave them some breathing space.

I stayed in the company for a short while, during which I ordered takeaway coffee and cake for everyone in the company, and sat with Ichichi Hoshige to watch the rehearsal of the band's new song.

At half past six he set out for the appointment.

In fact, as Yukinoshita had guessed before, he didn't want to participate in this celebration party.

However, after listening to what Yukinoshita said, he changed his mind.

The psychological transformation involved is actually difficult to describe in words, so let's just assume that he was persuaded by Yukinoshita's words.

After taking the tram and walking around, Chisato Suzumiya finally found the target store on a street full of fireworks.

The neon lights on the storefront form the signboard in a colorful way, and you can smell the unmistakable aroma of barbecue as you walk in.

The tables in the lobby were full of people, mostly office workers who had taken off their suits and were drinking and chatting. Business was pretty good.

After explaining to the waiter who came up to him and asked about the information, that the school dinner had been booked in advance, the waiter took the initiative to lead him to the door of a large private room, indicated that this was the place, and then bent down and retreated.

I could still hear laughter and chatter from inside through the sliding door. It looked like quite a few people had already arrived and the party might have already started.